Posts tagged ‘castrate resistant prostate cancer’

We have been following the results of the checkpoint inhibitors for several years now, first with ipilimumab (Yervoy) and lately with anti-PD1 and PD-L1 inhibitors such as nivolumab, pembrolizumab and MPDL3280A. Irrespective of the antibody used, the best results we’ve seen have in melanoma, lung and bladder, but some tumour types such as colon and prostate cancers have barely been responsive at all.

It’s now time to turn our attention to genitourinary oncology and, in particular, prostate, renal and urothelial bladder cancers. This week brings this ASCO GU meeting (#GU15), which is being held in Orlando this year and began this morning.

Over the last few years we have seen new therapies emerge for the treatment of advanced prostate cancer from immunotherapy to chemotherapy and second generation hormone therapies. Each of these has increased survival and outcomes. Along the way though, a host of other agents have fallen by the wayside with a raft of negative phase III trials that did not live up to their phase II promise. These include atrensentan, dasatinib, ipilimumab, lenalidomide and more recently, custirsen.

The results of the phase 3 clinical trial of dasatinib (Sprycel) plus docetaxel/prednisone versus placebo and docetaxel/prednisone in men with castration-resistant metastatic prostate cancer (CRPC) are expected soon.